Part 33

After we had seen a good deal of Venice we ascended the campanile of St. Mark. This is a wide square tower, and by a commodious sloping internal ascent the belfry is attained, where we get among the bells. The hours are struck by a man stationed to pull the ropes and watch for fires, which, when he discovers, he notifies to the proper quarter—a useful, but, I fear, a rare species of precaution against this species of calamity. The view from this tower (which is 322 feet high to the hair of the angel’s head, an altitude which I need scarcely say we did not attempt) is commanding, ranging over the city and lagunes, looking, however, as I have already said, a little too directly down upon the roofs of the houses below. However, one gets a pretty clear idea of the map of Venice, with its multifarious canals, islands, and narrow streets. As stated by Bædeker, the ‘15,000 houses and palaces of Venice (population, 128,901) are situated on 3 large and 114 small islands, formed by 147 canals, connected by 378 bridges (most of them stone), and altogether about 7 miles in circumference.’ I occasionally endeavoured to thread my way through the narrow streets of Venice, and considered it rather an achievement the first time I managed to pioneer through all the intricacies of the passage from the Piazza San Marco to the Ponte Rialto and back again. This famous bridge is a graceful marble arch, of one span of 74 feet, across the Grand Canal. An elegant marble balustrade protects each side, the space on the bridge being divided into three footways by two covered arched or arcaded buildings used as shabby little shops, which one would gladly see abolished, being so little in keeping with the handsome character of the bridge. Here at the Rialto there are also markets on either side of the canal, for the sale of fruit and other things.

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Situated on the Grand Canal, but nearer to the railway station, is the Museo Correr, in which we found a collection of pictures, armour, and curiosities, of no great extent, but said to be valuable. The Palazzo Marcello (proprietor, Richetti) contains a quantity of ‘antiquities,’ curiosities, bronzes, and other things manufactured for sale, some of them curiously designed.

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Nearer to the principal part of the town the Academia delle Belle Arti lies—a very extensive collection of paintings in twenty large halls, besides smaller rooms, the pictures numbering in all 679. These are all, with the exception of a few of the Dutch school, if I am not mistaken, the works of Italian artists, most of them by the great masters, and many on a large scale. Among others is what is considered Titian’s masterpiece—’The Assumption of the Virgin,’ a clear and brilliant, a glorious work in point of drawing and colour. In fact, the colour is perhaps rather too strong in reds and blues. One great canvas, a grand picture by Paul Veronese of the banquet in Levi’s house, occupies the entire breadth of the largest hall. The banquet is represented as held under a remarkably Venetian–looking light colonnade, open to the outer air, and peopled by characters evidently clothed in Venetian attire of the painter’s era. But it scarcely does to scan such works of art with too much regard to accessories. What appears to be the favourite picture is another Veronese—a Virgin with a young, naked, little St. John the Baptist standing on a pedestal, with legs to appearance (it may be merely the effect of shade) of unequal lengths. There were half a dozen painters when we were there, engaged in copying the chubby St. John. Copies of it may be seen in many of the shops of Venice. They are, I fancy, favourites with the ladies. We paid only one visit to the Academy, but it would take several visits to do its galleries justice.

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The arsenal of Venice, dating back to the year 1104, is well worthy of a visit for the sake of its museum, an interesting collection of arms and models of ships, particularly of the grand state gondolas; nothing but the museum is apparently shown to the ordinary visitor. The arsenal is not so extensive as it once was. Admission is had by simply entering one’s name in the visitors’ book, and, as usual at all these show places where admission is not by payment, giving a small fee to the _custodes_, one being stationed in each hall.

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A steamboat, large enough for the traffic, sailed every hour from the quay in front of our hotel to the island of Lido, about two miles distant. We crossed in it one afternoon; and the sail is interesting, as the vessel passes the other islands, and fine views are had from it of the town, and, in the distance, of the mountains of the Tyrol. The island of Lido is long and narrow. Upon landing we walked across to the other side, about half a mile of road. Here we were on the borders of the Adriatic. The island is a bright little spot with a few buildings on it. Returning, we got on board just in time to escape, under cover of its awning, a thunder–shower which came pelting down very heavily, and lasted all the time we were on board.

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We had now been eight days in Venice, and had been constantly going about seeing much that was to be seen, but yet only seeing it in a superficial way. There was no place in Italy which was more attractive. Its gorgeous palaces and churches, its strange, unique kind of life, the multitudinous canals teeming with gondolas, and the pleasure of moving about in them, was something we never could forget. We saw Venice usually in brilliant sunshine, with everything sparkling in light, although nearly every afternoon, with a severe punctuality which enabled us generally to be prepared for it, black clouds gathered, and a thunderstorm emptied them quickly. But perhaps the most beautiful sight of all was to see Venice in moonlight. One is familiar with photographs of the fair city, tinted with a deep blue in imitation of moonlight effect, a white spot being picked out for the moon herself (as, of course, the photographs are taken during the day), and I can hardly say that there is in these pictures much, if any, exaggeration. The blueness of the sky, and of everything with which the light is tinged in moonlight, is something remarkable and very lovely, while the effect is increased when the moon, getting behind a cloud, gives to the cloud a luminous edging of silver.

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We were exceedingly unwilling to leave this bright fairyland, but became afraid to stay longer. The fact is, that with all its attractiveness Venice has not, at least to a stranger, the feeling of healthiness. It drains into the canals, where the tide rises and falls only 2 feet, and has not force sufficient to carry off the drainage. The effluvium from the narrow canals is sometimes overpowering, and yet it is said, as it is said of so many other places one might imagine insalubrious, that Venice is naturally so healthy that the people are notedly long–lived; and, indeed, one instance of this occurs in the case of Titian, who lived to the patriarchal age of ninety–nine. How this comes, ‘let doctors tell.’

We left on 23d May, pursuing our way up the Grand Canal and under the Ponte Rialto, and on to the railway station,—a long pull, but one we always enjoyed. In fact, if a visitor do nothing but obtain a sail along this canal, he sees the greater part of Venice; just as, though much less completely, a stranger sees much of London by a sail upon the Thames, and would see more were the main buildings, as at Venice, placed upon its banks; which henceforth, perhaps, there is a hope they may be. The canal is, I think, about two miles in length, and on an average not less than 100 feet wide, and is lined by palaces, churches, and houses, in the utmost irregularity of height and diversity of character and style, many of them beautiful, while the canal itself is alive with gondolas; and the _tout ensemble_ is so picturesque, that when the sun shines, as it generally did, everything looks engaging to the eye. One by one we passed and gazed at the palaces (which had become, as it were, old friends) with many a lingering look, as if resolved we never should forget them. But the vision came to an end as we entered the modern and disenchanting railway station, whence we shortly after proceeded on our journey to Verona, the scene of _Romeo and Juliet_. Romance was not, therefore, to be quite at an end, and as the train issued out of the railway station the curtain was raised for a momentary glimpse; and slowly wending our way over the lagune by the long viaduct of 222 arches, we looked intently on the floating city, wondering if ever we should see it again. Losing sight of it lying on the one side, attention was forthwith drawn to the other by the line of the Tyrolese mountains, which at some distance were in view, and flanking us nearly the whole way. We passed Padua and Vicenza, and through a country which is flat, but was smiling in the greens of early summer, and after a journey of about seventy miles in four hours reached our destination.

VERONA.

We had proposed spending two nights at Verona, but American friends who came with us from Venice were anxious to get on to Milan, so that we had just two hours the following morning for a drive about the town. We regretted afterwards that our opportunity was not greater, for it is indeed a place at which one may stay for a few days with advantage. It is very picturesquely situated on the river Adige, and contains a good deal that is interesting. We first drove through the old market–place, where people were busy selling fruit, vegetables, and other things in a piazza surrounded by curious old houses. Then into the Piazza dei Signori, where are some very fine buildings, old and new, and adjoining it a small open space or square closely surrounded by houses, in which the noted and highly decorated tombs of the Scaligers, enclosed within a wall and railing, are seen. Then on to the Arena, which is not so imposing as the Colosseum or even the Arena at Nismes, and although covering more ground than the latter, was seated for fewer spectators; but it is in a very perfect condition—the most perfect, I think, of any we saw in Italy, the large marble slabs of which it is built being nearly all in place. We mounted to the top row, and had an excellent view of the country round about. From this we drove to the church of San Zenone Maggiore, a thousand years old, and very curious. The portal is peculiar, and adorned by rich marble reliefs. Within are some fine old pillars, said to be of single pieces of marble, a crypt, and cloisters—altogether a place of great interest and of striking conformation. We were only sorry we had so little time to examine it minutely, for we could take but a rapid walk round. Returning to town we entered two other churches,—San Fermo Maggiore, with an open ceiling in walnut wood, and the Duomo, which is quaintly ornamented; but we had seen so many Italian churches elsewhere that we were rather attracted to a little building at the end of a garden, said to be the tomb of Juliet. One is fain to believe in it, but as matter of fact it is discredited. This tomb so–called Juliet’s is an elegant, small, open, three–arched vault, or recessed covered place with slender double columns, containing within a sarcophagus. More certainty is attached to what is shown at a different part of the town as Juliet’s window; but, alas for the romance! the window looks into the street, and it has no balcony.

So rapid a survey was not doing justice to fair Verona. There was much more to be seen in the town, while the river and its bridges and surroundings, and the neighbouring country, all looked so picturesque and inviting, that I have no doubt it is a favourite halting–place for the artist, and it may well repay a visit of some days.

XVI.

_MILAN AND THE ITALIAN LAKES._

MILAN.

WE left Verona at mid–day for Milan. The scenery was fine, and for some miles we had Lake Garda, the largest of the Italian lakes, in view, at one part as near as only a mile off. Here we passed over the field of the battle of Solferino, which took place on 24th June 1859. An interest naturally attaches to ground where not many years previously a great battle was fought, and so many events were being enacted terrible to the actors, but there is nothing specially to mark it out. The day had been clear when we started, but before we got to Milan the clouds began to gather, the sky became very black, and we unluckily arrived at four o’clock in a thunderstorm. However, we had not far to drive down the wide Corso to the Hôtel de Ville, which is well situated near the Cathedral, in the principal street of Milan.

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We were out betimes next morning to see the glorious cathedral. It is certainly a magnificent church, inside and out, built of white marble, and of great size and height, being only inferior in size or extent to St. Peter’s.[42] It was not a little refreshing to see a Gothic church of any sort, after having had so much elsewhere in other styles. It is not divided into or surrounded by chapels, so that it wants the aid which these accessories afford for decoration; and therefore, in contrast with many less pretentious churches, there is a feeling of vacancy about it, although it is devoid of the gloom of the large, empty, dark Duomo of Florence. Fault, no doubt, has been found with the windows that they do not throw down the light sufficiently from above, but the windows themselves are traceried and filled with beautiful stained glass. Upon entering by the great portal at the west, the eye is caught in the far distance by the glimmering colours of the grand east window, whose dimensions are colossal, as may be gathered from the fact that its traceried compartments comprise no fewer than 350 pictures in glass, copies, in many instances, of known paintings. Then the eye is arrested by four long rows of lofty clustered columns—upwards of 50 in number in all—each 8 feet in diameter and 90 feet high, their comparative slenderness giving an airy character to the great interior, which rises in graceful pointed arches in the nave to the height of 152 feet. These pillars are most peculiarly adorned by a sort of double capital, between which are placed in canopied niches sculptured figures or statues in white marble, evincing that herein Milan is master; but somehow they do not attain the effect of a grand capital. The roof is painted in imitation fretwork or open carving, a species of deception which, however well done, is hardly to be expected, or even tolerated, where no cost has otherwise been spared.

The exterior has so light and fairy–like an appearance that one can hardly believe it to be of stone, and yet all the parts which look so light and delicate are in reality massive and substantial marble. The mass or quantity of statues is really surprising. Niches innumerable contain them, studded at every conceivable spot over the huge building. Every one of the countless pinnacles, besides being adorned in successive courses by them, is surmounted by a statue, a mute mast–headed man, patiently and uncomplainingly remaining where he has been ordered to do duty, and so aiding to adorn the magnificent edifice. The number of marble statues inside and outside has been variously computed, but cannot be less than 4000. The central tower may be objected to as fully too small or too light for the size of the building, but it is in style in harmony with the numberless spirelets which rise like a forest around it, sometimes in clusters, and spanned by flying buttresses in lace–like decoration, which give strength and stability to a structure which, if it were not irreverent to say so, has a good deal of the look, in its white purity, of a most gigantic and beautiful bride–cake.

We lingered about the cathedral on our first visit for a long time. It was grand to hear the great organ pealing through the vast chamber, although the music was not so fine as it had been at St. Mark’s on the Sunday.

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The following morning (for while at Milan we never missed seeing it every day) we again entered the church, and found an important service proceeding, apparently either a levée, or, more likely, a consecration of priests. An old bishop wearing a large mitre sat on his throne, and one after another young men ascended and knelt before him, when he placed his paternal hands on the head of each successively, and apparently kissed him. The string of those who thus went up for consecration seemed, like Paddy’s rope, to have had the other end cut off—we thought it would never terminate. But what struck me much was the remarkable want of intelligence in the faces of the old priests, particularly those who wore the grandest dresses; they had such a stupid, stolid look, reminding one very much of a ‘donnered auld Hieland porter.’ After witnessing enough of this ceremony, we ascended the stair leading to the summit, admission to which costs a small fee. The cathedral is 360 feet high, if not higher to the topmost point, for here also authorities differ; but the point I reached might not exceed 300 feet, and, if I am not mistaken, there did not seem to be open access to the public to a higher elevation. There are many breaks of the ascent by the way, where one can halt and look around and have a near view of the sculpture, which is by no means coarsely executed; the figures, however, upon the top of these long needle–shaped pinnacles convey a nervous dread of their stability, though, no doubt, securely fastened. About many of them lightning conductors are placed, without which they might only be points of attraction for the electric fluid. The roof of the building is composed of slabs of white marble in neat layers or courses overlapping each other upon a slope of moderate angle, giving a remarkably clean finish to the whole. It was glorious to think of this being a work of man. One could envy the feelings of the architect who had the honour to design and commence it, but did not live to see it completed. It was begun in 1385; the main body was finished thirty–three years later, but the central spire not till the year 1440. It may be said, therefore, that it is 450 years old, and yet it has such a freshness about it that one could readily suppose it is hardly a generation old. They are, however, always making additions to and repairing it. Standing upon the high tower, and surrounded by a forest of marble pinnacles and statues, and by rich sculpture at every point, the eye is yet attracted to the distant view from the summit, which is very magnificent. The country, which for miles from Milan is very flat but verdant, lies spread out in panorama, from Turin, 80 miles distant, to Venice, 150 miles off; but Venice, at least, is too distant to be visible, and I doubt if Turin, even by aid of a glass, can be descried. Right in front to the north, and thence west and east, within a radius of from 80 to 100 miles, the grand mountain ranges of Switzerland lie. We saw some of the snowy peaks, but unfortunately the sky was clouded, and the view of most of them was obscured. But we took note of where Mont Blanc, the Matterhorn, Monte Rosa, and other old friends might have been seen on a clear day, though it would require a good telescope to distinguish the different mountain celebrities. The Italian lakes are, with the exception of Lake Garda, between 30 and 40 miles distant, but, shut in by the mountains, they are not visible, although we imagined we could make out their situation. The city of Milan lay compactly spread out all around just under us, the cathedral standing very much in the centre of all.

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We were fortunate in getting a tolerably clear day for this ascent. I had intended to go up again on the following Monday, but found it too cloudy to be of any use. Another rather interesting sight, however, was in progress that day within the church; for an immense number of young children—boys and girls—were all seated in long rows round a vacant space, wherein were priests with candles, and an archbishop or some other dignitary, who was going round them. The girls were all dressed in white with white veils, the boys in their best attire, many of them with white ties and some with white waistcoats. The children seemed to be from seven to fifteen years of age, and by all it was evidently regarded as a grand gala–day—something like a public school examination–day in Scotland, before breaking up for the summer holidays. They were perhaps receiving confirmation. The procession of priests stopped at each child in rotation. The old bishop performed motions with his hands over each—I suppose making the form of the cross over them, and mumbling something inaudibly. It must have taken a long time so to go over them all, as there were several hundreds.

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The people of Milan have wisely left a large vacant space or piazza in front of the cathedral, upon its west side, so that one can admire, without intervening interruption, its beauty from a sufficient distance. On the south side of the piazza, or rather of the cathedral, the Royal Palace, a plain building, is situated. The piazza itself is surrounded on three sides by new and very handsome commercial buildings, which are quite an ornament to the place; and out of it, upon the north side, there has been built, at an expense of no less than £320,000, the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele—a splendid arcade, or rather street or streets of stone buildings, laid out in the shape of a cross, covered over by an iron and glass vaulted roof, upon the Crystal Palace model. The main gallery is nearly 1000 feet long, about 50 feet wide, and 94 feet high; and it is occupied in the lower floor by shops, and the upper floors apparently by warehouses or other places of business, the façades being of an elegant style adorned by sculpture. The central dome is particularly graceful, and at night is lighted up by a circle of gas jets placed round the top. These, with the other lights, produce a most brilliant effect, and it is scarcely surprising to find that in the evening the gallery is crowded by the townspeople and strangers, so that passage through it is rather difficult. This gallery—really the most perfect thing of the kind I have seen anywhere—leads out at the other end to another piazza, in the centre of which a very fine marble monument to Leonardo da Vinci has been erected. He stands surrounded by four of his pupils, all of white marble. In another part of the town is the famous picture by that artist of the Last Supper, a fresco which is almost obliterated. The charge for admission to see this celebrated work is at the exorbitant rate of 1 franc per person.

There may be seen gratuitously on the streets of Milan a picture of a different kind in the elaborately made–up head–dress of the women. In a pad of hair at the back of the head a dozen or two of long pins, of more or less magnificence, are stuck, in arrangements to suit the fancy of the wearer, but most commonly in a fan shape. It is not for man to pry into the hidden mysteries of the toilet, but it seems scarcely possible for any woman to effect this elaborate tire unaided, nor is it probable that the effect is achieved by a daily effort. The amount of nightly torture by acupressure to which the Milanese women may therefore subject themselves, in obedience to a law of fashion, is not agreeable to contemplate. We can only be grateful.

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